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Europe and North America have reversed centuries of deforestation and are showing a net increase in wooded areas, while most developing countries continue to cut down their trees, a U.N. agency said Tuesday.
The Rome-based Food and Agriculture Organization said in its biannual report on the State of the World's Forests that economic prosperity and careful forest management had positive effects.
However, poor or conflict-stricken countries where clear-cutting and uncontrolled fires are especially severe still face serious challenges in managing their wooded areas, the agency said.
Deforestation continues at an unacceptable rate'' of about 32 million acres a year, said Wulf Killmann, a forestry expert at the agency.
However, he noted in a positive sign that the net loss had decreased over the last decade from 22 million acres to 17 million acres.
Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean are currently the regions with the highest losses of wood-covered regions, especially in tropical areas.
Forested area in most European countries is also increasing, while it is stable in Canada and the United States.
SOURCE:
LiveScience.com
So is replanting DF in Europe producing a non-native forest or is it re-introducing a locally extinct species to its previous range? It is a matter of time viewpoint, isn't it?
Originally posted by Byrd
The commentaries I read on this celebrated the reversal in the US and Europe, but pointed out that elsewhere the deforestation continues at an increased pace. This is particularly true in developing countries.
A Nova program last night sort of addressed this, mentioning the floods and other problems already being caused by deforestation, along with the really horrible pollution.
BRASILIA, Brazil - Brazilian police arrested at least 25 members of an illegal logging scheme in the Amazon rain forest on Friday as part of a crackdown on deforestation in the world's largest rain forest.
Loggers, government officials and truckers were arrested in the vicinity of Altamira in northern Para state, where Sister Dorothy Stang, a U.S. nun, was gunned down by ranchers in 2005 for her defense of landless peasants and the environment.
Police have 35 arrest warrants.
The suspects "laundered wood" through a complex scheme of false shipping and bank documents, police agent Jorge Eduardo told Reuters by telephone from Altamira.
The group included officials of the environmental protection agency Ibama, who alerted timber mills to scheduled inspections.
Asphalt and Soya Dreams: Two Oceans, Two Countries and the Transoceanica
Chinese economy drives road-building and deforestation in the Amazon
Paving the Amazon rainforest to bring soybeans to China
Tina Butler, mongabay.com
April 17, 2005
...............
The big push to reach the Peruvian ports is the economic allure of the Asian market. Brazil already sends 18 percent of its exports to Asia, with this figure likely to increase at a rapid rate. China is literally inhaling soybeans from Brazilian soya farms in the country’s central and western areas, especially in the state of Mato Grosso. These former rainforest regions are increasingly being converted into farmland, all to supply the growing Asian demand, particularly with China’s exploding urban population.
Brazil has big plans for expansion in order to keep supplying this lucrative market. The agricultural minister, Roberto Rodrigues, has said there is another 90 million hectares available for planting, a significant increase over the current 62 million hectares being used for agriculture in Mato Grosso. In addition to soya, cattle ranching is also a leading use of land in the state.
Recently, Brazilian president,Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva led a delegation of several government representatives and hundreds of business leaders to China to encourage closer ties. After five days of talks on trade and diplomacy, a growing alliance was in the works. Brazil will supply the goods China requires and in return, China’s companies are positioning themselves to provide capital to help Brazil achieve massive expansion in its crumbling road, rail and port infrastructures. The Chinese interest is not limited to Brazil however, and this is where Peru, the Transoceanica and the controversy come in.
China fuels illegal logging in Burma
Global Witness release
October 31, 2005
A new report, launched today by Global Witness at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club in Bangkok , “A Choice for China – Ending the destruction of Burma’s northern frontier forests” , details shocking new evidence of the massive illicit plunder of Burma’s forests by Chinese logging companies. Much of the logging takes place in forests that form part of an area said to be “very possibly the most bio-diverse, rich, temperate area on earth.”
In 2004, more than 1 million cubic meters of timber, about 95% of Burma’s total timber exports to China were illegally exported from northern Burma to Yunnan Province. This trade, amounting to a $250 million loss for the Burmese people, every year, takes place with the full knowledge of the Burmese regime, the government in Beijing and the rest of the international community. Chinese companies, local Chinese authorities, regional Tatmadaw and ethnic ceasefire groups are all directly involved.
Myanmar gets a friend, China gets its forests
By Marwaan Macan-Markar
BANGKOK - An environmental disaster unfolding along the border that military-ruled Myanmar shares with China has all the elements of hypocrisy written large. In this case, the guilty party is China.
Yangon's junta finds itself trapped into silence due to the political capital Beijing has spent to protect the regime from increasing charges of oppression and human-rights violations leveled against Yangon by the international community.
The price of that silence has meant an army of Chinese loggers moving into Myanmar's northern Kachin state to strip that rugged mountainous area of its timber-rich forests.
"In 2004, more than one million cubic meters of timber, about 95% of Myanmar's total timber exports to China, were illegally exported from northern Myanmar to [China's southern] Yunnan province," states Global Witness (GW), a non-governmental organization.
24/03/2006
China is black hole of Asia’s deforestation
Jakarta, Indonesia – China is the main channel for illegal logging in Asia while the United States, Europe and Japan are the key markets for timber products and furniture coming from countries where the illicit practice is widespread and human rights are ignored.
Originally posted by Muaddib
...Does anyone remember which countries would benefit from the Kyoto protocol, and would be allowed not only to maintain but to increase their production and greenhouse gas emissions?
[edit on 19-3-2007 by Muaddib]